Ex-German envoy to Iran rips Iranophobic expert meeting in Berlin

Former German Ambassador to Iran, Baron Paul von Maltzahn lambasted a Berlin-based foundation affiliated with Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic party for staging an openly Iranophobic, AVA Diplomatic reports.

Von Maltzahn took the opportunity during a question-and-answer session between the audience and two American Mideast experts at the Konrad Adenauer Foundation for voicing his strong outspoken protest over the highly controversial anti-Iran.event triggering loud cheers of approval by the audience.

What I heard today was a ‘very one-sided and unbalanced presentation’ by two American experts and I really felt like I was in the US Congress among numerous Republicans who actually want to resume the policies of former US president

George W. Bush, added von Maltzahn who was Germany’s Ambassador to Iran from 2003 to 2006.

He was referring to a clearly politically-motivated Iranophobic speech by the research director of The Washington Institute, Patrick Clawson and a senior editor of The Weekly Standard and senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, Lee Smith who by his

own stunning public admission had never even visited Iran.

Both Clawson, a known avid supporter of the Zionist regime, and Smith branded Iran a major strategic danger, saying repeatedly the military option should not be ruled at all.

Smith and Clawson also tried to portray Iran as the region’s boogeyman.

Reacting to remarks by the US experts Iran was pursuing ‘an aggressive’ foreign policy, von Maltzahn stressed Tehran had ‘justified regional interests’ which from the point of view of the Iranian side needed to be defended.

The former head of the prestigious German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP) pointed out both Tehran and Washington had indicated their willingness to not only engage in negotiations on the nuclear dossier but also on other regional issues which according to von Maltzahn was also very necessary.

He referred to past examples of a constructive cooperation between the US and Iran in Afghanistan, before then-president Bush ended that cooperation with his ‘axis of evil’ comments.

Von Maltzahn expressed hope that a nuclear deal with Iran would actually create a new friendly atmosphere.

Meanwhile, a high-ranking official of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, speaking on condition of anonymity, told IRNA he felt very embarrassed and upset that his organization staged such an extremely biased and unbalanced expert meeting.

He emphasized both Clawson and Smith appeared to be actually out of touch with the realities of Iran.

The source warned that hosting such so-called ‘expert meetings’ could ultimately lead to a loss of academic credibility of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation when it came to scholarly Middle East research.

The conservative foundation has had a history of organizing a number of conferences and seminars on Iran’s regional role without even having an Iranian scholar or diplomat explaining or defending Tehran’s view.